Drugs in New Orleans

No Christmas tornadoes in Pensacola. There was one that hit in Mobile an hour away.  We just had wind and rain.

Hidden in the French Quarter is the New Orleans Pharmacy Museum.  It was built as a pharmacy and home by the first licensed pharmacist in the United States in 1923. It’s full of useful and not so useful medical treatments.

It starts with an ornate soda fountain .

 

 

There’s a lot of discussion on drugs that were acceptable years ago and not-so-much today like the “pain-killer” heroin (sold by the Bayer Company) as a substitute for the addiction of morphine.

 

Real live leeches. I’m amazed how popular blood-letting was in the past.

 

There’s a section on voodoo medicine like these voodoo dolls. There was also some discussion of love potions.  People didn’t want to be seen asking for love potions, so they were numbered and you could ask for Potion Five.  That’s where you get “Love Potion No. 9”.

 

There’s even a section on glasses.  I didn’t realize (or forgot) that Benjamin Franklin developed the bifocal.  Thanks, Ben!

The Pharmacy Museum was a good break from the hustle and bustle of the French Quarter. It was interesting to comtemplate the work pharmicists and doctors needed to do to find the right treatments for diseases.